In the first half of 2024 in the United States, Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department was the most popular album, while Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things” was the most-streamed song (by on-demand audio streams), respectively, according to data tracking firm Luminate.
Read more about midyear metrics in the 2024 Luminate Midyear Music Report.
‘Poets’ Perched on Top: For the tracking period of Dec. 29, 2023, through June 27, 2024, Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department was the most popular album in the U.S. The pop superstar’s studio set was released on April 19 via Republic Records and earned 4.66 million equivalent album units in the first half of 2024. (See full top 10 chart, below.) Poets spent its first 12 weeks atop the weekly Billboard 200 chart – the first album by a woman to spend its first 12 weeks at No. 1.
Poets is also the top-selling album, by traditional album sales, at the midyear point, with 2.47 million sold. The set is the top-selling album on CD (1.07 million), vinyl (988,000) and digital download (395,000) of 2024’s first six months.
The most-streamed song by on-demand audio streams (inclusive of user-generated content [UGC] streams) was Boone’s breakout hit “Beautiful Things,” with 448.7 million clicks in the first six months of the year. “Beautiful Things,” released via Night Street/Warner Records, marked Boone’s first top 40-charting hit on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 chart, and peaked at No. 2 on the tally in March.
Equivalent album units – for album titles and chart rankings cited below (but not industry volume numbers) – comprise traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sales, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album, or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official and audio streams generated by songs from an album.
Equivalent album units cited for album titles in this story, and in the “Midyear Top 10 Albums in U.S.” chart do not include user-generated content (UGC) streams. UGC streams are included in Luminate’s industry volume numbers and its midyear song streaming rankings. (UGC streams are not factored into any of Billboard’s weekly charts.)
For the sake of clarity, equivalent album units do not include listening to music on broadcast radio or digital radio broadcasts. All numbers cited in this story are rounded, and for the U.S. only. Programmed streams are not included in any of the data in this story.
Luminate (formerly MRC Data, Nielsen Music and SoundScan) began tracking music consumption in 1991. Luminate’s sales, streaming and airplay data is used to compile Billboard’s weekly charts.
Of The Tortured Poets Department’s 4.66 million equivalent album units earned at midyear, album sales comprise 2.47 million, SEA units comprise 2.16 million (equaling 2.82 billion on-demand official audio and video streams of the 31 songs on the deluxe edition of the album) and TEA units comprise 23,000.
The top five most popular albums at the midyear point in the U.S. are The Tortured Poets Department, Morgan Wallen’s March 2023 release One Thing at a Time (1.78 million), Noah Kahan’s October 2022 release Stick Season (1.22 million), Beyoncé’s March release Cowboy Carter (1.10 million) and SZA’s December 2022 release SOS (1.06 million). In 2023, One Thing at a Time and SOS were the Nos. 1 and 3 most popular albums of the year in Luminate’s year-end report.
